The Perfection of the Individual: Analysing Crowley's Individualistic Religion

The Perfection of The Fool: Analysing the Textual Basis of Aleister Crowley's Individualistic
Religion Through a Hermeneutics of Faith.
by
Thaddeus Tobin
A dissertation submitted in partial requirement for BA(Hons) in Religion.
Supervised by Dr Ben Schonthal
Department of Theology & Religion at the University of Otago.
___________________

2
Introduction
Aleister Crowley has been tied to the image of an evil, perverted,1
drug-addicted,2
baby-
murdering,3
Satanic4
sex magician.5
He is undeniably a divisive figure in the history of
religion. He is frequently and frivolously referred to as a ‘Satanist’ both in common, popular
representations such as newspapers6
and, more startlingly, academic writings. For example,
Karl Spracklen, a sociologist of Leisure Studies, and Beverly Spracklen, an independent
scholar, misdiagnose Crowley as ‘infamous Satanist of the twentieth century.’ He is labelled
as such in a footnote to an article on Paganism and Satanism in structuring the identity of
modern goths.7
John Symonds, the man entrusted with Crowley’s works after his death,
attempted to ‘Satanise’ Crowley by identifying Aiwass, his ‘Holy Guardian Angel,’ with the
Devil.8
Hugh Urban, renowned scholar of Aleister Crowley, notes that popular
representations attack him as a ‘king of depravity.’ Urban also insists that Crowley is rarely
taken seriously in scholarship and is often not even mentioned.9
Joshua Gunn, professor of
communications at the University of Texas at Austin, writing on representations of the occult,
1
Stanford, Peter. "Portrait: His satanic comedy: Aleister Crowley was the embodiment of evil, addicted to
bestiality, ritual blood sacrifice and corruption of the young. Or was he? A new book suggests he was a
maligned free thinker, putting on a hell of an act. Peter Stanford reports." Guardian, 2 July 1997.
2
Hugh Urban, “The Beast with Two Backs: Aleister Crowley, Sex Magic and the Exhaustion of Modernity.” Nova
Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 7: 3 (March 2004), 15.
3
Joshua Gunn, Modern Occult Rhetoric: Mass Media and the Drama of Secrecy in the Twentieth Century
(Tuscaloosa: The University of Alabama Press, 2005), 110.
4
Beverly Spracklen and Karl Spracklen, “Pagans and Satan and Goths, oh my: dark leisure as communicative
agency and communal identity on the fringes of the modern Goth scene,” World Leisure Journal 54:4 (2012),
360.
5
Jo Pearson, “Inappropriate Sexuality? Sex Magic, S/M and Wicca (or 'Whipping Harry Potter's Arse!'),”
Theology and Sexuality 11:2 (2005), 34.
6
“Secret Britain: Aleister Crowley's Satanic hideaway: Boleskine House, near Loch Ness.” Sunday Times, 20
March 2005.
7
Spracklen, “Pagans and Satan and Goths,” 360.
8
Caroline Tully, “Walk Like an Egyptian: Egypt as Authority in Aleister Crowley's Reception of The Book of the
Law,” The Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies 12.1, (2010), 22.
9
Hugh Urban, “The Power of the Impure: Transgression, Violence and Secrecy in Bengali Śākta Tantra and
Modern Western Magic,” Numen 50:3 (2003), 288-289.

3
recounts his experience as a child being warned of Crowley and occultism in his church, as
the preacher linked him with the sacrifice of babies.10
Crowley is either misrepresented or ignored in both the popular and academic
imaginations. He seems to be taken as a Satanist merely by virtue of being fundamentally
anti-Christian.11
Although his influence is no doubt felt in the Satanic groups which arose
following his death, he was not, himself, a Satanist. This attribution, like others, suggests a
more general trend: modern appropriations of Crowley have inappropriately determined how
he is understood historically. In this dissertation, I offer a different view. Rather than a
deluded Satanist, this dissertation reads Crowley as a serious religious founder. It argues that
Crowley constructed a complex system which reacted to Christianity in order to reclaim
religion for the individual. Crowley did this by undercutting the structure of ‘clergy’ and ‘lay’
in religion, as well as relocating ritual in the individual. This dissertation will demonstrate the
ways by which Crowley strove for an egocentric system of religion in which it is the
individual person who takes responsibility for their religious life.
Crowley is approached here as a unique, charismatic, and serious founder of a
distinctly individualistic religion. He is broadly situated in the fin de siècle period of
secularism in which tensions between religion and science as authorities were high. He is
understood as a product of this period in that he was brought up in a typically Christian
environment against which he eventually rebelled.12
Richard Kaczynski, one of the foremost
biographers of Crowley, describes the climate of extreme piety in which Crowley was raised.
His was a Brethren family with a strong, devout father. Crowley, at one point, made the
10
Gunn, Modern Occult Rhetoric, 109-110.
11
Anti-Christian here refers to his rebellion against the religion, not the figure of Christ. Elsewhere, Crowley
appears sympathetic to the man. See; Aleister Crowley, Magick: Book Four: Parts I-IV, 2nd
revised ed. edited by
Hymenaeus Beta (San Francisco: Weiser Books, 1997), 13-14.
12
Ibid., 392.

4
decision that he would be the most pious servant of Jesus in his school, promising to
‘astonish the world’ with his devotions.13
However, he later saw Christianity as hypocritical
following his father’s death. As he watched schisms emerge within the family, he grew to
hate the religion with which he was brought up. As Kaczynski narrates it, Crowley ultimately
decided that he would become the greatest sinner in the world, embracing the unforgivable
sin of rebellion against the Holy Spirit.14
Crowley did all of this in a period of history in which many people throughout the
Occident were beginning to believe that religion could be a choice, not something one is
bound to from birth.15
He was thus able to present his own religion as authentic divine
revelation in the marketplace of ideas. Crowley sought to establish this religion as an
individualistic reaction to the boyhood Christianity he grew to hate. He revoked the
communal power of religion so that the individual could dominate his own religious life.
Crowley named this new religion ‘Thelema,’ a name taken from the Greek word for
‘Will.’ He made numerous references to the concept of Will in the central moral edict ‘do
what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.’16
Crowley centred his religion on this idea. He
presented ‘True Will’ as a fundamental expression of ‘The Great Work,’ which he saw as the
ultimate goal of his religious pursuits. He connected these two ideas in that True Will
involves finding harmony with the Universe, the ideal path in life. He can perhaps best be
understood by reference to a close analogue; he would reject ‘destiny’ as this implies a final
goal driven by external forces. For Crowley, Will was about an individually driven,
continuous course through life. He posited this as ‘The Great Work,’ the ultimate goal of
13
Richard Kaczynski, Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley (Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 2010), 18.
14
Ibid., 23.
15
Christopher Partridge, The Re-Enchantment of the West Volume 1: Alternative Spiritualties, Sacralisation,
Popular Culture, and Occulture (London: T & T Clark International, 2004), 15-16.
16
AL I:40.; Crowley, Magick: Book Four, 133.; Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears (hosted at:
http://divinezeal.com/files/pdf/magick_without_tears.pdf), chapter XVIII.

5
Magickal working, ‘the uniting of opposites… the uniting of… the microcosm with the
macrocosm.’17
He saw True Will on these terms as one pursues their ‘correct’ course in life
in accordance with the Universal course: actively working towards synchronising the
microcosm, the self, with the macrocosm, the Universe.18
This dissertation places Crowley at the centre of the discussion, reading his religion
directly through his texts. The texts which are the centrepiece of the discussion include the
collection of works in Magick: Book Four and his letters collected in Magick Without Tears.
The former, Magick: Book Four, is a compilation of his major works collected and edited by
followers of his. Hymenaeus Beta, the current head of the Ordo Templi Orientis, a Thelemic
organisation led by Crowley, is the primary editor and makes clear where he contributes
instead of Crowley. Crowley dictated some of the content of Magick: Book Four, and wrote
other parts, which provides a text difficult to take a singular work. Crowley is, in any case,
the principle author of its content, as it is his words which are recorded in the book, whether
written or spoken by him. I use the second edition which contains extensive footnotes and
annotations by Crowley silently woven into the body, offering a more complete account of
his thought.19
Crowley produced different parts of this book at different times, and it is
frequently self-referential and assumes knowledge of certain ideas and terms. As a
compilation, there are repetitions and inconsistencies which arise, but these are of minor
consequence to the overall quality of the text as a complete account of Crowley’s thought.
Crowley’s religion is most clearly seen in Book Four because it covers a wide range of
reflections on his religious thought, both on the theoretical and practical sides.
17
Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears, Letter No. C.
18
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, 139.
19
Ibid., xv-xvi.

6
The Book of the Law is the central text of Thelema and an important part of the
discussion. I refer to the printed version as contained within Book Four, but it is worth
highlighting on its own here. The Book of the Law is a standalone religious text which, as the
focus of a significant part of Book Four, is included in its entirety within it. Crowley claimed
to have received this text in Cairo in 1904 according to a narrative which will be discussed in
the first section of this dissertation. I make a number of references to passages from this in a
similar way to how one would make Biblical references: using the common abbreviation
‘AL’ to identify the text,20
Roman numerals to identify the chapter, and a number to identify
the verse. For instance, a reference to chapter one, verse 42, the instruction that one ‘has no
right but to do thy will’ takes the form AL I:42.
Magick Without Tears, a collection of letters written by Crowley, has been cited from
its archived form hosted by Divine Zeal, a website which collects a number of occult and
esoteric writings.21
Crowley wrote these letters to students, answering their questions on core
elements of Thelema and his system of Magick. Magick Without Tears is divided into
chapters on key subjects, with a series of introductory letters identified by a letter of the
alphabet. This text lacks clear formatting which causes issues for specific citations. I have, in
lieu of page numbers, referred instead to particular letters or chapters where necessary.
I admit my position as an outsider to Crowley’s religion, but this is dissertation reads
his work in a generous light as though I was an insider. I give a level of credence to his texts
which common representations of him have neglected to do. I treat them with a careful
distance but open-mindedness in order to understand deeper meanings of the account. For
20
‘AL’ is a conventional abbreviation of the full title ‘Liber AL vel Legis, sub figura CCXX, as delivered by
XCIII=418 to DCLXVI.’ Crowley also identifies ‘AL’ with God.; Ibid.¸ 425.
21
While an internet resource, it faithfully reproduces the letters as Crowley had planned to publish them
himself. It has been checked for accuracy and matches the text as collected at
http://www.tomegatherion.co.uk/magickwithouttears.pdf and
http://www.horuscentre.org/library/Thelema/Magic_Without_Tears.pdf.

7
example, I do not believe that Crowley truly dictated The Book of the Law according to a
disincarnate voice he heard from the corner of his room, but I do believe that he believed it,
and that is what is interesting for the sake of discussion. I read them through what Paul
Ricoeur calls a ‘hermeneutics of faith,’22
acting to portray the system as if I was an insider. I
begin this analysis from the viewpoint that religious claims rely on a web of assumptions and
so, to understand them, they cannot be decontextualised from them. I do this by attempting to
enter the mind of Crowley to understand his perspective and ideas on his terms. I attempt to
be what Wendy Doniger identifies as the ‘hunter-sage,’23
to surrender my own beliefs and
views to implant myself in a foreign context while at the same time maintaining a level of
distance. For example, in recalling the narrative of his ‘reception’ of the holy text in Cairo, I
treat the story as if it were true in order to understand what this means in the broader self-
reflective understanding of Thelema for Crowley.
Crowley’s religious texts are informative for studies of religion because they
represent a counterpoint to a number of prominent theories of religion and ritual, which
approach religion assuming community as an inherent part of it. For example, Durkheim
identifies the locus of ritual in the collective effervescence of a group coming together,
departing from profane life to experience the sacred. For Durkheim, the participants identify
this experience externally, in a totem.24
But, for Durkheim, the sacred is nothing more than
the image and perception of the collective. Victor Turner’s theories make a similar
valorisation of the collective. In many of his writings, Turner posits ritual as being a method
of releasing social tensions by breaking down the social hierarchy. Turner’s theory defines
22
Ruthellen Josselson, “The Hermeneutics of Faith and the Hermeneutics of Suspicion,” Narrative Inquiry 4:1
(2004), 1.
23
Wendy Doniger, Other peoples’ myths: the cave of echoes (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1995),
12.
24
Emile Durkheim, The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, trans. by Karen E. Fields (New York: The Free Press,
1995), 223.

8
ritual in terms of ‘communitas,’ the sense of equality arising from the shared ritual
experience.25
Crowley, while he did prescribe certain rituals to be performed in groups, such
as the Gnostic Mass, emphasised the importance of the self and solo ritual practices,
internalising the focus of ritual as a way to generate power in the individual.
I will argue that Crowley’s Thelema represents an effort to reclaim the ‘self’ in
religious life by presenting it as an individualistic religious pursuit. He did this by
encouraging egocentric hermeneutical readings of texts, as well as relocating the centre of
ritual within the individual. I focus on Thelema as a religion rooted in The Book of the Law
and its commentaries, instructed by Crowley’s descriptions and prescription of rituals. I
decontextualise ritual from its roots in past esoteric schools in order to assess it as a practical
tool within Thelema. My focus is not on the specific schools which he founded, such as the
A.’.A.’. or O.T.O. as these involve greater input from outside influence than this study
permits.26
Crowley’s discussions of The Book of the Law and ritual are of primary importance
for how they fold into his religion of Thelema and its principle of True Will. I take True Will
to be the essentially defining characteristic of this individualistic religion as it promotes
egocentric religious pursuits.
In what follows, I separate the discussion into two sections: one on ‘theory’ and one
on ‘practice.’ In the first section, I look at Crowley’s prescription of interpretive readings of
The Book of the Law through the Hermetic Qabalah.27
In the second section, I look at
Crowley’s prescriptions for rituals and how he advises the Thelemite to act in order to pursue
their True Will. I argue through both of these sections that Crowley attempts to reclaim
25
Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Cornell: Cornell University Press, 1966), 96-
97.
26
They persist today throughout the world and are the two most important Thelemic organisations continuing
Crowley’s lineage. However, they are outside the bounds of this Crowley-centric study of Thelema.
27
I use this spelling throughout to distinguish Crowley’s use of the system from the traditional Jewish
Kabbalah.

9
religious life as a matter for the individual, rather than reliance on the community, and
liberate the individual by undercutting repressive structures of authority and subject. My
argument’s implication is that Crowley is of importance in the study of religion not only for
his role as founder of one of the most interesting new religious movements of the last century
and a half, but also as a counterpoint to classical models of religion and ritual.

10
Section I: Magick in Theory: Textual Interpretation and Authority in Crowley’s Thelema
Aleister Crowley’s system of Thelema is an essentially individualistic religion based
on the revelation of The Book of the Law. Crowley claimed to have received this text through
a divine experience while in Cairo, and used it as the basis of Thelema. Crowley, however,
initially distanced himself from the text. In his analysis of the reception in Magick: Book
Four, he claimed to have done so out of revulsion based on its air of violence, also seeing it
as unclear in its meaning and therefore unfit to share with the world.1
Kaczynski narrates in
Perdurabo that Crowley rediscovered the original manuscript in 1909 and came to believe
that it was his own True Will to disseminate the text. Crowley believed this rediscovery to be
orchestrated by external forces and so decided to take the text more seriously.2
He resolved
the issues he found in it by applying the Hermetic Qabalah and elevated The Book of the Law
to the centre of Thelema,3
declaring the revelation to be ‘a million times more important than
the discovery of the Wheel, or even of the Laws of Physics or Mathematics.’4
Crowley
entwined Thelema with a strong system of individualism while at the same time, asserting
authority over readings of The Book of the Law. He thus faced a problem in his attempt to
provide a strongly egocentric, self-determined religion while trying to maintain control over
the text.
Crowley’s interest in promoting self-directed study of texts by individuals is seen in
his revolt against the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, an esoteric organisation founded
1
He stated that ‘whether he liked it or no, Ra Hoor Khuit was indeed Lord of the Æon… whose innocence
meant no more than inhuman cruelty and wantonly senseless destructiveness.’ See; Aleister Crowley, Magick:
Book Four: Parts I-IV, 2nd
revised ed. edited by Hymenaeus Beta (San Francisco: Weiser Books, 1997), 422-423.
2
Richard Kaczynski, Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley (Berkeley, CA: North Atlantic Books, 2010), 189-
190.
3
4
Ibid., 427.

11
in England in 18885
which Crowley joined in the 1890s.6
He grew to dislike the secrecy of
the order, seeing this is a way by which they could maintain mystery and control over others.
He determined at this point that he would promote his occultism on its own virtues, vowing
to not use it to profit himself, instead encouraging the freedom of individuals to read and
interpret.7
However, he restrained this in a way by prescribing his own texts as the tools used
to achieve this. His use of the Qabalah as a clearly delineated symbolic system showed his
distaste for secrecy as a method of control, but his prescription of his own works ultimately
undercut these claims.
Crowley was deeply invested in solving the issues he saw in The Book of the Law
because it presents the core ideas of Thelema. He used this text, as well as the reception of it,
to reinforce his system of Magick and assert it as the authentic divine word for the Æon of
Horus, the era of human history following its ‘revelation.’ He therefore had to ensure that it
was understood in the light in which he would have it. Taking a critical perspective, it is
likely that Crowley did not want to directly assert his own authority on the grounds that he
was author of The Book of the Law as this would ultimately undercut his claims that it is of
divine origin. He instead posited Aiwass, his ‘Holy Guardian,’8
as the author and authority
who used the syncretic system of the Hermetic Qabalah. Crowley considered himself an
authority on the Qabalah, and therefore his texts remained the filter through which The Book
of the Law ought to be interpreted. He was thus able to retain indirect control of The Book of
the Law by subtly controlling the hermeneutical tools which are used to interpret. Crowley
provided a solution to a broad question posed by Joshua Gunn, scholar of ineffability and
5
Dan Burton and David Grandy, Magic, Mystery, and Science: The Occult in Western Civilization, (Bloomington,
Indiana; Indiana University Press, 2004), 298-301.
6
Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 59-60.
7
Joshua Gunn, Modern Occult Rhetoric: Mass Media and the Drama of Secrecy in the Twentieth Century,
(Tuscaloosa; The University of Alabama Press, 2005), 79-80.
8

12
communication; ‘if supernatural truths are, in fact, supernatural, then how does one become a
legitimate authority of such truths?’9
His solution was to associate himself with Aiwass, and
assert Aiwass as the authority.
Crowley claimed that Aiwass was a higher intelligence with an extensive knowledge
of the systems of Qabalah, and therefore the Qabalah is the tool which ought to be applied in
interpreting The Book of the Law. He rejected the idea that Aiwass was a part of himself,
perhaps his subconscious mind, as this would imply he possessed extensive knowledge and
power otherwise unknown to him. He instead stated that Aiwass ‘is an Intelligence possessed
of power and knowledge absolutely beyond human experience… a Being worthy, as the
current use of the word allows, of the title of a God.’10
I argue in this section that Crowley’s discussions of The Book of the Law attempt to
emphasise individualistic interpretation, while Crowley concurrently asserted himself to
provide the authoritative interpretation. Crowley clearly promoted Magick and Thelema as
individualistic endeavours, stating that ‘every human being is intrinsically an independent
individual with his own proper character and proper motion.’11
I look at a number of his
pieces of work below which examine how this plays out in reading and interpreting The Book
of the Law.
The first subsection details the key facts of the creation of the text by Crowley, as
well as some important details regarding its structure and meaning. The second subsection
notes some of the problems Crowley had with the text which motivated his use of Qabalah as
a way out. The third subsection looks at how and why Crowley used the Qabalah as a
hermeneutical tool to pull apart The Book of the Law and unveil its true meanings. The final
9
Gunn, Modern Occult Rhetoric, 117.
10
11
Ibid., 127.

13
subsection looks specifically at how Crowley dealt with the conflict between promoting
strong individualism and self-determination in religion, while at the same time apparently
wishing to retain authority over interpretations of the text. He ultimately appears to have
arrived at the conclusion that he was not to be deemed the authority on The Book of the Law,
rather he was the authority on Qabalah, and that this is to be used in interpreting the text. He
therefore struggled to assert Thelema as thoroughly individualistic because of the constant
reliance on his own commentaries and work on the Hermetic Qabalah.
Crowley’s Revelation
Crowley’s narrative of the writing of The Book of the Law appears to be used to
legitimate its place as an authentic religious text, as well as setting in motion the problem of
whether he is in a position to assert himself as an interpretive authority. This subsection will
deal with the salient details of Crowley’s supposed reception of The Book of the Law, as well
as some preliminary notes concerning the nature of the book and the revelation. I introduce
these to set the context of Crowley’s own trail of thought down which he went in attempting
to understand the text and its place not only in his life, but in the lives of others.
Crowley used the narrative of the reception of The Book of the Law to establish
Thelema as an authentic, divinely inspired religion centred on the individual. His story will
be primarily pieced together between the account in Magick: Book Four and Richard
Kaczynski’s biography of Crowley, Perdurabo: The Life of Aleister Crowley. Crowley and
his new wife Rose had been travelling through Asia in 1903 when they discovered that she
was pregnant. He decided that the Scottish winter was not suitable for her in her pregnancy,
so they decided to stay in Cairo until spring. He converted a section of the flat into a temple
for himself.

14
Crowley attempted to reinforce his claim that the experience was divine by involving
Rose as something of a disinterested party who shared the experience. While attempting to
reveal the spirits of the air to Rose, she began to repeat the phrase ‘they are waiting for you.’
He became frustrated over the following days as she continued to repeat this until she went
into a trance state and informed him that the ancient Egyptian deity Horus was waiting.
Crowley asserted that, because Rose had no prior interest or knowledge of the subject of
Egypt, there must have been something significant in her experience worth investigating. He
went through a series of challenges with her in order to better understand the nature of the
experience. He asked her to identify a series of characteristics associated with Horus
including his moral qualities, his enemy, the colour associated with him, his place in the
temple, his weapon, planetary nature, number, and an array of other criteria. He calculated
that the chances of guessing her way through this were weighted at twenty-one million to one
against her, quickly coming to accept the supernatural nature of the experience.12
Crowley further attempted to reinforce the legitimate supernatural nature of the
experience by presenting it as uniquely targeted at him by external forces. He stumbled
across what would come to known in Thelema as the ‘Stele of Revealing’ in a museum
during this questioning process.13
Rose identified Horus in the form of Ra-Hoor-Khuit. To
Crowley’s immense delight, the stele was marked with the catalogue number of ‘666.’14
He
now became convinced that she was in fact in contact with Horus. He allowed her to provide
him with instructions on performing an invocation to the god which he tried without success.
He studied the stele over the following days and sought to learn as much as he could about it.
12
Ibid., 410-413.; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 123-126.
13
Caroline Tully, “Walk Like an Egyptian: Egypt as Authority in Aleister Crowley's Reception of The Book of the
Law,” The Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies 12.1, (2010), 21.
14
Ibid., 39.

15
He was now tentatively accepting that it was in fact Aiwass speaking through Rose,
channelling Horus as a messenger.
Crowley was now equipped to ‘receive’ The Book of the Law. He entered his temple,
on Rose’s channelled instructions, at noon on the 7th
of April, and again every day for three
days, writing as he heard for the next hour.15
He thus created The Book of the Law in 1904,
although he did not accept its contents or importance until 1909.16
His rejection of the book
will be a focal point in the following subsections as the eventual acceptance marks the steady
ascent of the text to the centre of Crowley’s attention and ushers the complex issue of who
has the authority to interpret it.
One can assume Crowley distanced himself as the author of the text in order to
present it as authentic divine revelation, not merely his own creation. Crowley instead
credited Aiwass primarily as the direct source of the work, although the content of the text
itself implies Nuit, Hadit, and Ra-Hoor-Khuit,17
each authoring a chapter.18
Crowley posited
these deities as representing different æons in history, but it is important to note that they are
not objects of reverence.
Crowley utilised a complex system of numerology to link together names and
concepts in The Book of the Law. He used Gematria, a system taken from the Jewish
Kabbalistic tradition, by which letters are given a numerical value which is then used to
calculate numbers which represent words and phrases. He applied this to a great extent in his
interpretation of the book because it is a tool by which he could link phrases and words
together according to their numerical values. For example, Crowley assigned the text the full
15
Ibid., 41-42.
16
Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 189-190.
17
These three are appropriated from ancient Egyptian religion and used in Thelema. He interprets them to
represent infinite space, the infinitely small but omnipresent point, and the unity of these two, respectively.
See; Crowley, Magick: Book Four, 137.
18
AL I:1.; AL II:2.; AL III:1-3.

16
title ‘Liber AL vel Legis, sub figura CCXX, as delivered by XCIII=418 to DCLXVI.’19
Crowley used the first half to simply refer to it as ‘Book 31, or The Law,’ also using ‘CCXX’
to denote the number of verses.20
He used ‘XCIII’ to denote the deliverer, also identifying
this number with 418. He was obviously applying Gematria here, because a surface reading
would imply that he was stating that ‘93’ shares its numerical value with ‘418.’ He stated that
‘93 is the number of the word of the Law – Thelema – Will, and of Agape – Love, which
indicates the nature of Will.’21
‘418’ is of similar but somewhat relegated significance,
primarily used with reference to the magickal phrase ‘ABRAHADABRA.’22
He imbued both
of these with significance with regards to the speaker: Aiwass. Depending on the spelling of
‘Aiwass/Aiwaz,’ including what language, Aiwass can variably be associated with ‘93’ or
‘418.’23
He was clearly referring to himself with the Roman numeral ‘DCLXVI,’ ‘666.’ The
sum of this is that we have The Book of the Law, 220 verses, delivered by Aiwass to Crowley.
He thus tied himself to the text as the ‘recipient’ of it, establishing himself as being in a
unique position with regards to it which he used to legitimise his authority over it.
Crowley highlighted the ‘Cairo Working’ as the apex of his Magickal life, however
this was not stated until almost forty years after the event. He states: ‘at that time most of The
Book of the Law was completely unintelligible to me, and a good deal of it – especially the
third chapter – extremely antipathetic. I fought against this book for years; but it proved
irresistible.’24
19
20
Perhaps coincidentally, ‘220’ is also the number one gets when multiplying the number of Sephiroth (10) on
the Qabalistic Tree of Life with the number of paths (22).
21
22
23
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, fig. 21.
24
Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears (hosted at:
http://divinezeal.com/files/pdf/magick_without_tears.pdf), Letter No. A.

17
Crowley’s Rejection
Crowley claimed to have not immediately accepted The Book of the Law as an
authentic and authoritative religious text, which somewhat ironically strengthened his later
claims to its authenticity. He claimed to have largely ignoring it between its dictation in 1904
and its rediscovery in 1909. In this narrative, Crowley’s rejection of The Book of the Law was
at first a product of revulsion felt towards its content, and secondly for the grandiose nature
of the task assigned to him. He did not discuss in depth why exactly he refused to accept the
text, which poses a problem, although reasons for this can be drawn from his numerous
discussions of the book post-1909. He explains in a discussion written in 1920 that he was
‘angrily unwilling to proceed with that part of the Work appointed for him which is detailed
in Chapter III’ and that he ‘wrote it, hating it and sneering at it, secretly glad that I could use
it to revolt against this Task most terrible that the Gods have thrust remorselessly upon my
shoulders.’25
His use of this retrospective look suggests that the process of rejection and
acceptance falls within a narrative in which he implied that he was himself sceptical about it,
but later ‘saw the light.’
Crowley’s specific attacks on Chapter III raise the question of exactly what part of it
he, the self-identified Great Beast, deemed so objectionable. Chapter III is best characterised
as violent in general, being associated with the ‘War God’ form of Horus.26
Crowley
described his own reluctance to Chapter III27
which includes the passages ‘Mercy let be off:
damn them who pity! Kill and torture; spare not; be upon them!’28
as well as the instructions
to fortify an island, preparing it with weapons and machines of war.29
25
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, 422-423.
26
AL III:2-3.
27
28
AL III:18.
29
AL III:4-8.

18
Crowley offered some passages which he found troubling in The Book of the Law, and
reasons for the application of the Qabalah as a cryptographical tool. He referred to the
example of AL II:27 which states that ‘He shall fall down into the pit called Because.’
Crowley identified this as referring to a proper name based on the capital letter given for
‘Because.’30
He went on to say that the meaning of this may lie in the Greek or Hebrew
equivalents of the word, which will permit a Qabalistic understanding of it. ‘Because’ is
further mentioned with a capital ‘B’ in; II:28, ‘Now a curse upon Because and his kin;’ II:29;
‘May Because be accursed for ever!;’ II:33; ‘Enough of Because!’ He clearly understood that
such verses are meaningless at face-value, and thus demand an interpretative tool so that they
can be properly understood.
Crowley’s eventual acceptance of The Book of the Law, according to his own
narration of events, was due to the deaths of a number of his children, as well as the mental
decline of his lovers.31
He suggested, then, that The Book of the Law offered a way by which
he could contextualise his suffering in terms of Will because these were examples of
‘obstacles’ which arose because he rejected his calling to pursue his True Will. He stated that
he:
swore that He would renounce His personal possessions to the last penny… Death
dragged away His children with slow savagery; the women he loved drank themselves
into delirium… Now, having endured to the end, being Master of Magick, He is
mighty to Work His True Will; which Will is, to establish on Earth His Word, the
Law of Thelema. He hath no other Will than this.32
30
31
Ibid., 229.
32
Ibid.

19
Kaczynski links this to the warning in The Book of the Law that if the Scarlet Woman
impedes Will, then the gods will seek vengeance by slaying her child and casting her from
men into exile.33
Crowley’s suffering was therefore granted clear meaning in light of
Thelema. He found it necessary to clarify and reinterpret that which he found objectionable
or ambiguous so that he could justify the promotion of The Book of the Law as an authentic
and useful religious text. In doing so, he set out a narrative in which his suffering legitimised
the text, and law of Thelema, insofar as it was viewed as evidence that he was susceptible to
these pitfalls which resulted from not living according to his True Will. His self-professed
transition from sceptic to prophet seems to suggest his detachment from the text, which he
eventually saw as the authoritative word of the Æon of Horus.
Crowley thus implicitly raised the question of authority in textual interpretation, as he
was the recipient of the text, but its scope was not limited to only him. He granted supreme
authority to The Book of the Law as the religious text of Thelema. For Crowley, his reception
and dictation of The Book of the Law was conducive to his ‘Great Work,’ the promulgation of
Thelema. Crowley, in placing The Book of the Law in such a position, inevitably raised the
question of interpretation and authority. Crowley appeared to offer three conflicting positions
which will be discussed in the following subsection: that he is sole authority in interpreting it,
that he is the authority in resolving matters of dispute, and that the understanding of The Book
of the Law is primarily a matter of individual interpretation. He applied the heuristic of the
Hermetic Qabalah to this end.
33
AL III:43.; Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 161.

20
How Crowley used the Hermetic Qabalah
Crowley’s hermeneutical weapon of choice was the Hermetic Qabalah, an interpretive
system of symbols. He used this to grant The Book of the Law its authority because he
asserted that it was so enveloped in symbolism beyond his own capabilities that it could only
be explained by divine revelation. He therefore used Qabalistic techniques to unravel and
explain the multiple meanings contained within it. He stated that, where issues arise as to the
obscurity of the language, the syntax, grammar, spelling or capitalisation of letters is
irregular, non-English words are used, or there is otherwise ambiguity, he ‘shall seek for a
meaning hidden by means of Qabalistic correspondences.’34
He implied through this that
there is need for a clearly detailed hermeneutical tool against which the text can be examined
and interpreted.
Crowley prescribed the Hermetic Qabalah, and by extension Gematria, to interpret
The Book of the Law. He did this with the goal of establishing a method by which it could be
read through a hermeneutics of individualism: with a set of tools, any person can read and
understand the text within the context of their own True Will. He used it to absolve the text of
the issues he found in its lack of clarity and otherwise objectionable content. He did however
run into a problem regarding authority. Crowley’s complex relationship between himself and
the text means that he does not see himself as the author, which entailed that he could not
claim authority over interpretations on the grounds that he wrote it. He struggled with this
issue over time, ultimately concluding that The Book of the Law is meant to be studied and
interpreted by individuals, while his own techniques and interpretations were to be tools to
assist with this. In doing so, Crowley attempted to both free individual adherents to interpret
it while binding them to a hermeneutics of his own design.
34

21
Crowley’s use of Hermetic Qabalah follows the Western Esoteric tradition which
extends from the work of Eliphas Levi. Egil Asprem, expert on esotericism and cognitive
processes in religion, argues that Crowley represents the culmination of this particular
lineage.35
Crowley departs so significantly from the tradition that Gershom Scholem, one of
the most highly regarded scholars of the Jewish Kabbalah, rejects his works on the
Qabalah/Kabbalah outright.36
The Hermetic Qabalah, however, is a syncretic system forged
in the appropriation of new cultural information in the esoteric underworld, primarily through
the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.37
Crowley fit within a framework of occultists and esotericists who actively
appropriated and reimagined past religious traditions in light of their social, political,
economic, and cultural surroundings. His use of Qabalah lay in this, as a hermeneutical tool
which he applied to contextualise all matters as expressions of the divine. For example, he
detailed his use in a letter:
as I walked about, I made a point of attributing everything I saw to its appropriate
idea. I would walk out of the door of my house and reflect that door is Daleth, and
house Beth… Then you come to the fence of your property and that is Cheth - number
8, number of Tarot Trump 7, which is the Chariot: so you begin to look about for your
car. Then you come to the street and the first house you see is number 86, and that is
Elohim, and it is built of red brick which reminds you of Mars and the Blasted Tower,
and so on.38
35
Egil Asprem, “Kabbalah Recreata: Reception and Adaptation of Kabbalah in Modern Occultism,” The
Pomegranate: The International Journal of Pagan Studies 9.2 (2007), 133.
36
Ibid., 132.
37
Ibid., 135-136.; J. Lawton Winslade, “Techno-Kabbalah: The Performative Language of Magick and the
Production of Occult Knowledge,” The Drama Review 44:2 (2000), 94.
38
Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears, Letter No. F.

22
Crowley showed how he took basic, everyday experiences and related them to the Hebrew
alphabet, Tarot, and Gematria. He demonstrated how the individual ought to use Qabalistic
methods as classificatory and contextualising tools. He was able to use it as a way by which
one establishes connections between objects and ideas within a religious or esoteric
framework. Crowley used it in this way when applying it to The Book of the Law.
Crowley is most telling of his Qabalistic intentions in his exegesis of the text:
Where the text is simple straightforward English, I shall not seek, or allow, any
interpretation at variance with it. I may admit a Qabalistic or cryptographic secondary
meaning when such confirms, amplifies, deepens, intensifies, or clarifies.39
He made it clear that Qabalistic techniques are primarily used in order to draw meaning from
the text that may not be immediately apparent, or even necessarily present. His use of such a
schematic granted him the ability to manoeuvre through the text and present it in almost any
way he wished to because it opened up any word or phrase into a cacophony of
interpretations.
Crowley applied this interpretive tool to a number of the passages mentioned above.
For example, AL III:4-8: at face value, the verses quite literally provide instructions to claim
and fortify an island. Crowley reinterpreted this as explaining the necessity of choosing a
particular nerve-centre and fortifying it against outside influence, that it might be used in a
new form of meditation.40
He thus escaped having to carry out such an extreme instruction by
applying a symbolic understanding to the text, making it more palatable for himself.
39
40
Aleister Crowley, The Old Comment, (hosted at http://hermetic.com/legis/old-comment/), Chapter III.

23
Another example approached the issues regarding the word ‘Because’ used as a
proper name as is found in AL II:27, 28, 29, 33. He was remarkably esoteric in his exegesis
of these, even for Crowley. He interpreted II:27, which reads:
There is great danger in me; for who doth not understand these runes shall make a
great miss. He shall fall down into the pit called Because, and there he shall perish
with the dogs of Reason.
To mean:
The importance of failing to interpret these verses. Unspirituality leads us to the bird-
lime of Intellect. The Hawk must not perch on any earthly bough, but remain poised
in the ether.41
He made clear here the way by which myriad meanings are able to be drawn from the verses
of The Book of the Law. He was reading the verse as an instruction to be sceptical, that one
ought to remain open to religious concepts because failing to do so can land one in the ‘trap’
of ‘Reason.’ He seemed to be taking ‘Because’ to refer to some principle of causality as is
‘deified’ in science, and that the individual ought to ‘remain poised in the ether’ in order to
avoid being bound to such a system of thought.
Crowley similarly used Qabalistic methods to pull apart the meaning of the word
‘fool.’ He wrote in a commentary on The Book of the Law in Magick: Book Four that the
word ‘fool’ is used throughout in a particularly convoluted symbolic way. He wrote with
reference to the line ‘The fool readeth this Book, and its comment; & he understandeth it
not.’42
Crowley explained that, while the meaning of this at first glance was clearly to
denigrate those who cannot understand the text, it actually made reference to the ‘wise fool’
41
Aleister Crowley, The Old Comment, (hosted at http://hermetic.com/legis/old-comment/), Chapter II.
42
AL III:63.

24
Parzival, who he identified with Frater O.I.V.V.I.O. He was identifying them also by their
Qabalistic number ‘418,’ which signifies the Magickal phrase ‘ABRAHADABRA.’43
Crowley was also known to have referred to himself as ‘The Fool’ in Tarot, thus placing
himself into the narrative of the book.44
He also linked ‘The Fool’ with the 'microcosm' and
the 'aimlessness and fatality of all things.’45
For him, The Fool was 'the organ of possible
expression,' 'The Unconscious Self not yet determined in any direction.'46
Crowley identified
Aleph, the letter of The Fool, as being of utmost importance in the Aeon of Horus and crucial
to understanding The Book of the Law.47
Crowley went on to say:
Parzival had also the name Achad… and Achad means Unity, and the letter of Unity
is aleph, the letter of “The Fool” in the Tarot. Now this Fool invoked the Magical
Formula of the Æon by taking as his Magick, or True, Name one which added also to
418…48
Crowley continued almost relentlessly. His use of Hermetic Qabalism allowed discussion to
cascade into a constellation of meanings and understandings, muddying the text. He was
therefore justified in his wish to control it to some extent, and provide ‘stops as thou wilt’49
where he deemed necessary. He thus called on the question of authority when it comes to
textual interpretation; who is in the position to interpret religious text? Is it possible to assert
authority within the context of a fundamentally individualistic religion? Does this strip the
individual of their right to pursue religion according to their own True Will and
understanding?
43
44
45
46
Ibid., 161.
47
Ibid., 155.
48
Ibid., 425.
49
AL II:54.

25
Crowley and the problem of authority
Crowley, armed with his Qabalah, now needed to reconcile the question of authority
with his view that Thelema is a personal and individualistic religion. He no doubt saw the
decentralisation of occult and religious authority in a positive light.50
His reaction against
Christianity was in part due to his vision of hypocrisy in the religious authorities in his life, so
it is no surprise that his reclamation of religion for the individual would extend to textual
interpretation. However, his position as recipient of The Book of the Law and desire to
maintain some control over it conflicts with this approach. He offered constantly changing
accounts of this over the decades following its reception and acceptance, so it is most useful
to attempt to follow some key points along the road chronologically.
Crowley initially prescribed the study of The Book of the Law to each follower of
Thelema. He wrote in 1919 that ‘the basis of our whole work is The Book of the Law. It is
essential for every Probationer51
to study this book and those which are directly connected
with it, as commentaries.’52
Crowley, as will be seen, offered significantly different views in
later years. He was at this point clearly of the opinion that each student must engage in direct
study of The Book of the Law, as well as its commentaries, as he outlined in the curriculum of
the A.’.A.’..
Crowley continued to instruct the individual to study the text in the following year,
although positing himself as ultimate adjudicator on disputes. He wrote in 1920 of the text ‘I
am certain… that this Third Chapter of The Book of the Law is nothing less than the authentic
Word, the Word of the Æon,’53
and also that ‘I will obey my orders (III:42) “argue not;
50
Gunn, Modern Occult Rhetoric, 79-80.
51
Early initiate to a Thelemic order. Specifically the A.’.A.’. in this context.
52
53
Ibid., 422.

26
convert not”; even though I shirk some others.’54
He was clearly admitting that he was
picking from a spectrum of instructions and messages the few that he saw fit to follow, as
further indicated by the fact he ignored the instruction to claim and fortify an island. He was
implicitly raising the question of authorship as he clearly separates himself from the text. His
interpretation of the text as providing instructions for himself showed a clear differentiation
between himself and who he deemed the true author; Aiwass, who laced the text with ‘a
cipher involving higher mathematics, and a knowledge of the Hebrew, Greek, and Arabic
Qabalahs… veiled within the casual silk-stuff of ordinary English words’.55
He thus
introduced to the discussion the Qabalah at this stage as a tool for drawing the true meaning
from The Book of the Law. He in turn used the complexity of the cryptographical tool to
legitimate its place as a true piece of divinely dictated religious text. He was therefore
justified in wanting to explore and find the meanings he believes Aiwass to have hidden
within it as doing so, for him, would further demonstrate its divine origins.
Crowley tied off this discussion with a reference to AL I:36, stating:
It is “My scribe Ankh-af-na-khonsu”… who “shall comment” on “this book” “by the
wisdom of Ra-Hoor-Khu-It”; that is, Aleister Crowley shall write the Comment from
the point of view of the manifested positive Lord of the Æon.56
He similarly stated:
I lay claim to be the sole authority competent to decide disputed points with regard to
The Book of the Law, seeing that its Author, Aiwaz, is none other than mine own Holy
54
Ibid., 423.
55
Ibid., 424.
56
Ibid., 439.

27
Guardian Angel, to Whose Knowledge and Conversation I have attained, so that I
have exclusive access to Him…. My award is therefore absolute without appeal.57
Crowley thus clearly stated his prevailing attitude of the time: he was sole authority to
interpret and comment on The Book of the Law because it was through his own personal
guardian angel that it was received. He went on to detail that ‘The Comment’ ought to be
internally consistent, hold The Book of the Law as the ultimate authority, reflect the
supernatural nature of its true author, Aiwass, be clearly comprehensible by all, and be
timelessly relevant.58
His ambitious goal in presenting such a comment suggests the urgency
he saw in getting the interpretation of the text correct, and portraying it as accurately as
possible. Hymenaeus Beta, editor of Book Four, links these references to a comment which
frequently follows printings of The Book of the Law, known as either The Short Comment, or
The Tunis Comment.59
Crowley’s Tunis Comment introduces a new complexity to his struggle with authority
and individual study of the text. He wrote The Tunis Comment in 1925. It is a paragraph of
text affixed to the end of the text, separate to the verses, which provides instructions for the
reader of the text. I include it in full here:
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. The study of this Book is forbidden.
It is wise to destroy this copy after the first reading. Whosoever disregards this does
so at his own risk and peril. These are most dire. Those who discuss the contents of
this Book are to be shunned by all, as centres of pestilence. All questions of the Law
are to be decided only by appeal to my writings, each for himself. There is no law
57
Ibid., 440.
58
Ibid., 441-442.
59
Ibid., 442.

28
beyond Do what thou wilt. Love is the law, love under will. The priest of the princes,
Ankh-f-n-khonsu, 666.60
Crowley signed this off with one of his many pseudonyms, and made clear his thoughts on
the work at the time. His own signature at the end of this passage is noteworthy in itself as it
does not claim to be sourced from Aiwass, and so there is no pretence of this being divinely
inspired. He instead straightforwardly expressed his own view at the time. His comment,
however, is able to be interpreted in two ways: at face value, as a prohibition against its
study, or as a symbolic warning of what is likely to come from its study.
Crowley’s comment can be read at face-value, stating explicitly that the work ought
not to be studied. He instead directed the reader to study his own texts on the law of Thelema.
Crowley’s statement ‘All questions of the Law are to be decided only by appeal to my
writings, each for himself’ demonstrates his image of himself as the ultimate authority, but
with the desire to keep open the avenues of individual interpretation. He warned that those
who do not heed this are to be rejected ‘as centres of pestilence.’
Crowley can alternatively be understood as providing a warning to individual
Thelemic aspirants of what will happen, rather than what ought to. He would then have been
writing this as a warning for the individual that study of the book is forbidden by others in
society, and that those who discuss the content will be shunned by all. Crowley, in this latter
reading, showed a departure from the writings in 1920. He made a weaker claim to authority,
still positing that his work is the ideal method by which one can understand The Book of the
Law, but at the same time asserting his control through a kind of fear tactic. He showed a
form of elitism implicit in Thelema: the individual must accept that, in pursuing Will, they
face being ostracised and must live on their own strengths. Crowley was then highlighting the
60
Ibid., 386.

29
individualistic nature of Thelema in that undertaking the study of The Book of the Law carries
with it the necessity of being able to live as an individual, outside the community. His
religion is therefore not only individualistic by virtue of its focus on the participant mastering
their own religious life, but because it entails that, to an extent, the withdrawal from
community and society.
Crowley’s Tunis Comment is unlikely to have been entirely sincere, so may not be
very indicative of his overall view of interpretations of The Book of the Law. He appears to
have written this as a result of frustration with Norman Mudd, a follower of his. Mudd had
been attempting to push for his own interpretations and exegeses of the text, and so Crowley
was motivated to silence him with this, which he achieved.61
However, his prohibition against
the study of the book, even if only to keep Mudd quiet, still countered his prescription of it as
the authoritative word of the Æon intended for all to read and interpret.
Crowley, in later years, appeared to relinquish the authoritative role in favour of
allowing undirected and alternative individualistic interpretations. He wrote in an unabridged
first edition of his ‘autohagiography,’62
The Confessions of Aleister Crowley, that The Book
of the Law:
Claims to offer a method by which men may arrive independently at the direct
consciousness of the truth of the contents of the Book; enter into communication
directly on their own initiative and responsibility with the type of Intelligence which
informs it, and solve all their personal religious problems.63
He went on to state that he is ‘in a chronic state of despair’ due to the ‘utter inadequacy’ of
his mind to fully understand the book, and that ‘twenty-six years of study have demonstrated
61
Kaczynski, Perdurabo, 403.
62
His own joking subtitle for the text.
63

30
this with pungent precision.’64
His statement that it had taken 26 years of study best places
this quote between 1930-1936, depending whether it is taken from the point of its reception
or his acceptance of it. Crowley was likely referring to the latter, which places this in the
mid-1930s. He clearly showed a distinct attitude towards readings of The Book of the Law as
compared with that espoused in The Tunis Comment quoted above. Crowley no longer
asserted that The Book of the Law ought only to be studied through his writings, rather stating
that the text promotes itself to each individual to study and learn from. He now accepted the
complexity of the text and its hidden meanings more fully than he previously had. He was
also indicating that, faced with his inability to fully and satisfactorily unpack the text, he
would prefer to surrender to his own weaknesses rather than give up the text. He did so with
the effect of handing over the right to study and interpret to individuals. He appeared to now
be aware that, if he wished to present his religion as universal, it would be impossible to
unpack The Book of the Law in such a way that there could be a singular interpretation that
applied to all people. He relinquished claims to hold sole authority in favour of allowing
individual people to find their own meaning in it. Crowley continued his humility when he
wrote in 1943 to a student:
I do assure you that the whole of my life’s work, were it multiplied a thousand fold,
would not be worth one tithe of the value of a single verse of The Book of the Law…
make The Book of the Law your constant study. Such value as my own work may
possess for you should amount to no more than an aid to the interpretation of this
book.65
Crowley, whether offering mere modesty, broke from his tendency to write more grandiose
statements through which he presented himself in extremely high-esteem and authority. His
64
Ibid., 698.
65
Crowley, Magick Without Tears, Letter No. A.

31
phrasing was of note as it clearly held his own works in very high esteem, but only to the
extent that they aid the student in understanding The Book of the Law. He in fact placed
himself on the same level as the student by stating that while ‘it is not actually wrong to
regard me as a teacher… it is certainly liable to mislead; fellow-student, or, if you like,
fellow-sufferer.’66
I believe that this ought to be taken as the definitive position at which he
landed because it suggests an honesty and humility rarely found in his work. He had here
reached a point at which he no longer asserted himself to be the sole individual imbued with
the power to interpret The Book of the Law, instead encouraging his ‘fellow-students’ to
study it themselves and, where necessary, consult his work for guidance if needed. He
seemed to retrospectively relegate his works in order to promote individualistic readings,
prescribing them merely as aids in achieving individualistic interpretations. His willingness to
strip his life’s work of its strong claim to authority emphasises the extent to which he wished
individuals to read and interpret these materials themselves. He did however maintain his
own outline of the Hermetic Qabalah as the classificatory tool that ought to be used to aid
these interpretations, demonstrating some unwillingness to fully hand over the text to
anarchic exegeses. He promoted the direct reading and interpretation of The Book of the Law
as a religious text, but filtered through a particular hermeneutics.
Conclusion
Crowley asserted that The Book of the Law ought to be read and interpreted by the
individual while struggling to fully support such a claim. His work on Qabalistic
interpretations wove a complex web of symbols, language, and metaphor which closes in on
demanding its own tool for interpreting. Crowley, for all of his talk of universality and
66
Ibid.

32
accessibility, still seemed bound to a system of esotericism that calls not only for initiation
into a particular realm and way of thinking, but intensive study on a particular subject and
classificatory scheme. He was therefore unable to truly escape a model of religion in which
there is a dichotomy of student and teacher. He came incredibly close but, to the extent that
he prescribed his own work on the Hermetic Qabalah as the interpretive tool, he remained in
control of how it was applied. He asserted that he was a student in his later writings, but it
appears to be a unique burst of modesty with it ever in mind that he held specific knowledge
crucial to occult and esoteric matters. He remained adamant that The Book of the Law is a
matter of interpretation for the individual student, but prescribed his own work on the
Qabalah as the proper hermeneutical tool which ought to be applied. He, on one hand, was
able to accomplish his goal of promoting an individualistic, even Lutheran, approach to
reading religious texts. On the other hand, Crowley still clearly delineated the bounds in
which this could occur by setting the rules for interpretation.

33
Section II: Magick in Practice: Ritual and the Individual in Crowley’s Thelema
Aleister Crowley’s rituals are prescribed primarily as ways to serve the individual in
their religious pursuit of Will. He cultivated a uniquely dark image as the Great Beast which
has largely overshadowed the complexities of his system, providing a lens through which his
work is read and interpreted. For example, in his claim that the ideal sacrifice is that of a
young male, he offered a character which largely cohered with the vitriol, such as the
popular-press induced title of ‘the wickedest man in the world.’1
In his discussion of Magick
in Magick: Book Four, Crowley stated in the context of sacrifice:
For the highest spiritual working one must accordingly choose that victim which
contains the greatest and purest forces. A male child of perfect innocence and high
intelligence is the most satisfactory and suitable victim.2
A footnote then explains that he performed such a sacrifice ‘about 150 times every year
between 1912EV and 1928EV.’3
Practical issues of sacrificing 2,400 children aside, it is
unlikely he could have continued to practice his rituals when such a thing was so publicly
published. Hymenaeus Beta, in an editorial note to this, highlights that Crowley cautioned
against taking this section literally, it being intended as a joking reference to masturbation.
However, he was sufficiently able to fuel the attacks against him and dismissal of the more
serious side of his work. This section therefore will attempt to build more accurate picture of
Magick as it was imagined by Crowley, as a self-serving individualistic dimension of
1
Hugh Urban, “The Power of the Impure: Transgression, Violence and Secrecy in Bengali Śākta Tantra and
Modern Western Magic,” Numen 50:3 (2003), 274.
2
Aleister Crowley, Magick: Book Four: Parts I-IV, 2nd
revised ed. edited by Hymenaeus Beta (San Francisco:
Weiser Books, 1997), 206-207.
3
‘EV’ means ‘Era Vulgaris,’ referring to the ‘Common Era.’ Crowley no doubt used this as retaliation against
using ‘Anno Domini.’; Ibid., 207.

34
religious life. His rituals are striking for their strong sense of isolation, insofar as they are
performed by one person to serve themselves.
Crowley’s individualistically orthoprax approach to Magick and ritual sets Thelema
as a practically egocentric religion. In the present section, a number of elements of ritual
Magick as detailed by Crowley are taken and analysed. The first subsection looks at the
explicit definition of ‘Magick’ as given by Crowley, and some important elements of his
cosmology as are relevant to the present study. In the second subsection, I investigate some
of Crowley’s descriptions of ritual tools and the ritual space, and their relation to the
performer. He identified such a great array of these things with far greater complexity than is
appropriate here so a select few are taken and examined. In the final subsection, I describe a
specific ritual as an example of structured applied Magick. The Star Ruby ritual, an
elaboration of the Lesser Banishing Ritual of the Pentagram, exemplifies the nature of the
individualistic ritual as an ‘everyday’ ritual. Crowley prescribed banishing rituals of this type
to be performed at the beginning of any ceremony.4
I also look at how Crowley extends
individualistic practice outside the ritual format, as a matter of self-cultivation and
empowerment. Overall, this section acts to build a clearer view of Magick as understood and
utilised by Crowley and his religion of Thelema. He used it as a self-serving way by which
one aided themselves in pursuing their Will and exemplifies the egocentrism of Thelema.
Crowley’s presentation of magick and cosmological significance
Crowley’s own definition of ‘Magick’ is the best way to root any discussion of the
function of his rituals:
4
Ibid., 624.

35
MAGICK is the Science and Art of causing Change to occur in conformity with
Will… Any required Change may be effected by the application of the proper kind
and degree of Force in the proper manner through the proper medium to the proper
object… Every intentional act is a Magical Act.5
For Crowley, Magick was simply the application of some degree of force in order to bring
about some change in the world. He offered the example of his Will being the dissemination
of Thelema; he deemed it an act of Magick that he applied the force of using his pen, the
‘magical weapon,’ in the proper manner so that he could share his ideas with others. The
words, ‘incantations,’ were written so that all could understand them, in ‘magical language.’
He then called on publishers, ‘spirits,’ to spread the work.6
Crowley’s definition clearly offered itself to an individualistic reading. For him,
Magick was the general view that all actions could be deemed acts of Magick to the extent
that they serve one in fulfilling their ultimate purpose in life. Magick was anything that aided
one in pursuing ‘True Will,’ the goal of which is to achieve unity with the Universe. His
definition went on to state that:
Every man and every woman has a course… which is natural and necessary for each.
Anyone who is forced from his own course… comes into conflict with the order of
the Universe and suffers accordingly. A man whose conscious will is at odds with his
True Will is wasting his strength… A man who is doing his True Will has the inertia
of the Universe to assist him.7
Crowley identified the duty of the individual Thelemite to be the use Magick in order to
synchronise themselves with the Universe, thus serving their pursuit of Will. He tied all
5
Ibid., 126-127.
6
Ibid., 127.
7
Ibid., 127-128.

36
actions into his broader cosmology of Thelema, making clear the importance of following
one’s True Will in order to live free of obstacles. This is what is meant by the ‘Great Work.’
He stated explicitly that ‘the Great Work is the raising of the whole man in perfect balance to
the power of Infinity.’8
Crowley most clearly explained his meaning in a letter in 1943,
recorded in Magick Without Tears, that the ‘Great Work is the uniting of opposites… of the
microcosm with the macrocosm, of the female with the male, of the ego with the non-ego.’9
This is the root of a complex path in which one confronts and annihilates the ego and any
sense of ‘Self’ as distinguished from the Universe. Crowley therefore saw the goal of
religious pursuits to be entirely located in the individual person and their self-elevation.
Crowley set this as an element of The Great Work because the individual needed to
achieve this symphony with the Universe in order to be able to pursue their Will. Alex Owen,
professor of British social and cultural history, states that, for Crowley, this was all in aim of
one of the greater traditional goals of occultism in which one seeks to attain completeness.
This was accomplished through the transgression of dualistic thinking, which allows the
individual to avoid the restrictions entailed in dichotomising the Self against the external
world.10
The magician is then free to pursue their True Will as it frees them from the
obstacles of the external world. For Crowley, once the individual united the microcosm, the
Self, with the macrocosm, the Universe, they were acting in conjunction with their True Will.
He believed that they had achieved unity with the greater Universal scheme. In Crowley’s
words, he ‘has the inertia of the Universe to assist him.’11
8
Ibid., 139.
9
Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears (hosted at:
http://divinezeal.com/files/pdf/magick_without_tears.pdf), Letter No. C.
10
Alex Owen, The Place of Enchantment: British Occulture and the Culture of the Modern (Chicago: University
of Chicago Press, 2004), 211-212.
11

37
Crowley emphasised the importance of the mental states of the individual in being
successful in these religious actions. He instructed that each person relinquish the
‘Tendencies’ of the mind as influenced by past experiences. He poetically phrased it in Liber
65, V:22: ‘Even as the diamond shall glow red for the rose, and green for the rose-leaf; so
shalt thou abide apart from the Impressions.’12
He viewed it as essential to break away from
the binding of past experiences as these limit the scope of one’s ability to understand new
ideas. He believed that new information is contextualised within the past schemes built up,
and so it limits the ability to receive new ideas. Crowley saw this as a limiting factor on the
individual and therefore it ought to be broken from by exposing oneself to ‘distasteful facts’
until one has achieved indifference.13
His transgressive approach is indicative of his
transvaluation of values, the necessity of individuals to overcome restrictions in the pursuit of
their own individual True Will. His ritualistic method for training the mind in this way will
be touched in on a later subsection.
Crowley best exposed his views on Magick through the rituals he described as they
incorporate a number of important parts of this cosmology, as well as demonstrating the
importance of each individual’s actions. Crowley clearly saw Magick pervade all aspects of
Thelema, but it is in the specific rituals that he was able to assign particular actions.
Crowley’s rituals are essentially egocentric, but the universality of the rituals suggests that
there is common ground across all people. Crowley, however, managed to weave
individualistic customisation into the fabric of Magick in a number of ways, most notably in
the tools and ritual space involved in the workings.
12
Ibid., 98.
13
Ibid.

38
Crowley’s ritual tools and space
Aleister Crowley’s rituals are excellent paths by which to navigate Thelema as they
can be seen as applications of Magick in a structured format. His rituals act as a control
variable around which individual personalisation of the Magickal working can be established,
primarily in terms of the ritual space and tools used. He offered detailed explanations of how
each of these reflected the individual who was practicing it. He focused on the relation of the
implements used, as well as the ritual space, to the magician. He interlaced this with his
conception of the Great Work, in which one attempts to unite themselves with the Universe,
as all aspects of the ritual endeavour are in some way connected to and unique to the
magician.
Crowley offered an expansive array of tools which are used in his rituals. He
identified sixteen aspects of the ritual in the Magick: Book Four chapter on ‘Ceremonial
Magick,’ which he discussed in specific detail; The Temple, The Circle, The Altar, The
Scourge, Dagger, and Chain,14
The Holy Oil, The Wand, The Cup, The Sword, The Pantacle,
The Lamp, The Crown, The Robe, The Book, The Bell, The Lamen, and The Magick Fire.
He thus offered the arsenal of the ceremonial magician. He succinctly links these in the
preliminary notes to the chapter;
The magician works in a Temple… in this Temple a Circle is drawn upon the floor…
Within the circle stands an Altar… Upon the Altar are his Wand, Cup, Sword, and
Pantacle… On the Altar, too, is a phial of Oil, surrounded by a Scourge, a Dagger,
and a Chain, while above the Altar hangs a Lamp. The Magician wears a Crown, a
14
The Scourge, Dagger, and Chain are grouped as one.

39
single Robe, and a Lamen, and he bears a Book of Conjurations and a Bell… In the
East is the Magick Fire.15
He did not mean that all of these things are necessarily utilised in any given ritual, just that
they are considered all that is needed for one. Israel Regardie, prominent occultist who
followed Crowley, will be taken as a counterpoint to highlight Crowley’s own approach. He
argued that ritual components are not necessarily a complicated affair as it is their
representations that are of utmost importance. For example, they differ on the status of the
Altar, an implement that I will describe in more detail below: Regardie stated that there need
not be an elaborate Altar for rituals, and that the four elements about the compass points may
be represented by everyday objects. The Altar may simply be a waist-high table covered in a
black sheet, while the element of air may be represented by a fan made of folded up paper,
fire by unused matches, water by a small glass of water, and earth by some salt and
breadcrumbs.16
Regardie was of the opinion that meaning and representation take priority
over any intrinsically Magickal qualities in a given object: the way by which they act on the
mind of the practitioner in their symbolism that grants their value in the ritual. Regardie
urged against complexity, emphasising that rituals ought to be a simple affair marked by
energy and enthusiasm.17
I offer this to contrast Crowley’s view.
Crowley’s approach to understanding ritual implements, on the other hand, suggested
immense complexity in order to suit the individual, such that implements were designed in
reference to and represented extensions of the ritual performer. Crowley emphasised
symbolism chosen by the magician, implying that there is some levity in this, but he seemed
to imbue far greater intrinsic value in the objects. For example, regarding the Altar, Crowley
15
Emphasis in original; Crowley, Magick: Book Four, 48.
16
Israel Regardie, Ceremonial Magic: A Guide to the Mechanisms of Ritual, (Great Britain: Aeon Books, 2007),
15-16.
17
Ibid., 17.

40
assigned great importance to the physical dimensions of it. He stated that it is to be comprised
of two stacked cubes, thereby having ten faces; two on each of the four sides, plus the top and
bottom. He stated that the Altar ‘must embody the Magician’s knowledge of the laws of
Nature,’ and that he ought to ‘make geometrical constructions to symbolize cosmic
measurements.’18
It would therefore say a great deal about the magician’s proficiency to have
the Altar simply draped in a black cloth as Regardie permits. Crowley granted room for the
personalisation of the Altar to the extent that it embodied the pursuit of the individual
magician’s True Will, but emphasised the unique connections it held with the magician.
Crowley symbolically interpreted the ritual space and its relation to the individual
performing the ritual. He identified the Temple with the external Universe, stating the
Universe shares the same area as the practitioner, and thus all that exists outside the Temple
is considered to be non-existent for the individual.19
He expanded on this in his description of
the ritual Liber V vel Reguli, in which he declared ‘I am Omniscient, for naught exists for me
unless I know it. I am Omnipotent, for naught occurs save by Necessity…. I am Omnipresent,
for naught exists where I am not.’20
Crowley granted supreme power to the individual insofar
as they govern all that exists around them. This can be seen as a continuation of the ‘Great
Work,’ as it follows from the idea that the individual becomes identified with the Universe
through his Magickal actions, thereby allowing the pursuit of his True Will. The Temple
therefore represents the domain in which he holds mastery of both himself and the Universe
around him, demonstrating the way by which the individual is understood to be the centre of
their own religious life. Thelema stands in stark contrast to religions which externalise the
18
19
Ibid., 48.
20
Ibid., 577.

41
focus to some totem, as the Thelemite centres ritual practice on themselves instead of a God
or higher being; the Thelemite becomes the higher being.
Crowley attached further significance to the association of the Temple with the
Universe and its connection to the individual. For Crowley, the significance of this was that
ritual is focused on uniting the Microcosm with the Macrocosm, identifying the Self with the
Universe. He understood the external Universe to be essentially non-existent for the
magician. He therefore placed huge weight on the magician remaining within the circle
during the ritual. He said this for two reasons: first, the Circle is deemed to be the purified
area in which the magician is protected from outside forces. Second, the purified area is the
only area in which the ritual can be effective, as it is cleansed of all possible intrusion.
Crowley implied in the discussion of banishing rituals that there is an ever-present risk of
intruding spirits in a given working which can impede the individual’s success. The corollary
of this is that the magician is capable of compelling them to keep away, meaning that external
and immaterial forces do exist which are capable of manipulation through Magickal
workings. His ritual, Liber V vel Reguli, can be seen as an example of this. Reguli,
alternatively known as the Ritual of the Mark of the Beast, is an invocation ritual designed to
summon and assimilate powers. He prescribed this ritual as a way by which one is able to
harness the powers of the Æon of Horus for the purpose of utilising them in the pursuit of
Will.21
He therefore offered multiple ways by which rituals act to serve the individual in the
pursuit of Will, both as ‘negative’ removals of harmful forces, and as ‘positive’ calls for
forces to serve the magician.
Crowley emphasised the connections between the Circle and the magician as
representative of their Great Work. He stated that the Circle sets the boundaries of the ritual
21
Ibid., 573.

42
area and therefore it is of great importance for the individual to use the correct measurements.
He left it more or less up to the practitioner to choose where in the Temple it is positioned,
but placed specific constraints on the nature of it which will be addressed below. He posited
that the centre of the circle is to include ten squares; five horizontal at the lower side, with
another five positioned vertically over the middle one. These represent the ten Sephiroth on
the Qabalistic Tree of Life.22
Around this inverted T-shape are the three corners of a triangle,
shaped as diamonds. Around these diamonds is a circle. The circle is thick enough to
accommodate the ‘Names of God,’ names chosen specifically by the magician with the
purpose of helping to accomplish his goal. Crowley emphasised the complexity of this in
stating that even the ‘most learned Qabalist’ may struggle for years to identify the names
salient to his work. Finally, outside the circle are nine equidistant pentagrams, each of which
has a candle in the centre. Crowley permitted that, for the sake of simplicity, the candles used
in the ritual may be made from beeswax, as the fat of one’s slain enemies can be difficult to
come by.23
His instruction that the magician chooses the particular names of God to surround
them shows that Crowley did not see this as Universal, and that care must be taken to choose
those which are appropriate for the individual. The Circle thus becomes uniquely useful to
the individual as it is catered to suit them and their own Will exclusively. He expanded on
this personalisation in discussing the Altar.
Crowley described the precise size of the Circle with relation to the Altar. The Altar is
described as the ‘solid basis of the Work, the fixed Will of the Magician.’24
Crowley stated
that the Altar must reach the navel of the magician, and be comprised of two stacked cubes.
This therefore dictates the size of the Circle, as the size of the base of the Altar determines
the size of one of the squares in the circle. Therefore, the sides of any given square are half
22
The Sephiroth, emanations, represent expressions of the infinite God.
23
24
Ibid., 55.

43
the height of the magician’s navel. The Altar should then be covered in geometric design
according to the magician and his understanding of the laws of Nature, as it is representative
of his ‘Great Work.’ Crowley makes very clear here the extent to which the magician’s ritual
space is a very personal affair, as all aspects of it stem from their own personal
characteristics. He also makes this explicit in describing the Lamen, another tool described as
part of Ceremonial Magick.
Crowley posited the Lamen to be among the most important symbols in the ritual as it
represents par excellence the work of the individual magician.25
He stated that it represents
Tiphareth, the Sephira signifying beauty, and is to be of a unique design representing the
Great Work.26
He compares it to a ‘Coat of Arms,’ which expresses ideas pertaining to the
characteristics of the wearer.27
For instance, Crowley’s own Lamen includes the following
symbols; the septagram, hexagram, pentagram, Rosy Cross, Yin-Yang, Mark of the Beast, the
Eye of Horus, and Hierophantic Cross.28
He incorporates an array of symbols which he
understands to represent himself and his work. The shape of the Lamen as a physical object is
a circle, which he sees unites it with the Circle and Pantacle, that latter being a disc broadly
representing the ‘All.’29
The Lamen is therefore conceived as a complex symbol uniting
various aspects of the individual, entailing that it will uniquely represent their own True Will.
Crowley built an interlocked network of symbols which unite various concepts of the
ritual, such as the place of the Self and one’s own True Will. This had the effect of allowing
Universal rituals to be prescribed, while at the same time catering them to the individual
through the personalisation of the implements used. Crowley managed to balance the
25
Ibid., 111.
26
Ibid.
27
Aleister Crowley, Magick Without Tears, Chapter XX: Talismans: The Lamen: The Pantacle.
28
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, fig. 16.
29
Ibid., 95.

44
strictness of the ritual and the tools involved, while at the same time opening it up to be
highly personalised and specific to the individual performing it.
Ritual Action and the Individual
Crowley’s Magick as defined above is clearly directed to the individual. This fact can
be seen most clearly through his rituals. Crowley’s Star Ruby ritual both presents a kind of
basic ritual prototype for Crowley’s system of rites as well as exemplifies the individualistic
focus of Crowley’s interpretations of ritual in general. This subsection describes The Star
Ruby, a ritual adapted from The Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram. The Lesser Ritual of the
Pentagram is a ritual prescribed by the Golden Dawn, while The Star Ruby is a distinctly
‘Thelemic’ rewriting of it. I describe the essential differences between the two in order to
demonstrate Crowley’s innovations and intervention in occult ritual practices. I also look at
how Crowley viewed particular actions as imbued with power, and how this demands the
self-cultivation and discipline of the practitioner.
Crowley detailed the ‘The Star Ruby’ in Magick: Book Four as a banishing ritual for use
in the official documents of the A.’.A.’.. It has been split into six sections for the sake of
analysis. I include it to demonstrate how such individualistic rituals operate in Thelema.
1. The ritual begins by positioning the practitioner facing East and breathing deeply.
They then close their mouth and press their right forefinger to their bottom lip. The
hand is then rapidly dashed downwards while the breath is forced out in the chant
‘APO PANTOS KAKODAIMONOS,’ the Greek words translated by Crowley to
mean ‘away every evil spirit.’

45
2. The right forefinger then touches the forehead and the practitioner says ‘SOI,’ the
phallus and says ‘O PHALLE,’ the right shoulder and says ‘ISCHUROS,’ the left
shoulder and says ‘EUCHARISTOS,’30
finally clasping the hands and crying ‘IAO.’31
3. The magician is then to advance to the East, imagining the pentagram. They then
make the ‘Sign of Horus,’ leaning towards the East with index fingers together and
thrusting them directly ahead of their eyes,32
roaring ‘THERION.’ They then relax
into the Sign of Harpocrates, standing straight with the right index finger covering the
mouth.33
4. The practitioner now moves around the compass points counter-clockwise, repeating
step 3) but instead of roaring ‘Therion,’ says ‘Nuit’ while facing North, whispers
‘Babalon’ while facing West, and bellows ‘Hadit’ while facing South. Back at the
centre, the practitioner cries out ‘IO PAN’ while performing the N.O.X. signs, a
number of physical gestures similar in nature to those described above.
5. The ritual concludes with the practitioner taking the position of ‘Osiris Slain,’
standing straight with the arms out in the shape of a cross, and saying in Greek
‘before me the Iynges, behind me the Teletarch, on my right hand the Synoches, on
my left the dæmons, for about me flame the Star of Five and in the pillar stands the
Star of Six.’
6. Step 2) is repeated to mark the end of the ritual.34
30
Hymenaeus Beta translates these Greek terms as ‘thy,’ ‘phallus,’ ‘mighty,’ ‘beneficient,’ [sic] respectively.;
Ibid., 569.
31
This is an important and incredibly common formula in Crowleyan rituals and works. Lon Milo DuQuette,
prolific writer on occultism, defines it as ‘I’ referring to Isis, ‘A’ to Apophis, and ‘O’ to Osiris, as the gods of the
Gnostics; Lon Milo DuQuette, The Magick of Aleister Crowley: A Handbook of the Rituals of Thelema, (Boston,
MA: Red Wheel/Weiser, LLC, 2003), 85.
32
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, fig. 34A.
33
Ibid. fig. 34B.
34
Ibid., 569.

46
The Star Ruby is notable for its simplicity, insofar as it does not involve the use of ritual
implements as other rituals are inclined to do. A all it seems to require is the Circle.
The Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram differs in some small but notable ways. Crowley’s
changes initially stand out in the names of the gods recited while ‘casting forth’ the
pentagrams; IHVH, ADNI, AHIH, and AGLA are replaced by THERION, HADIT,
BABALON, and NUIT, respectively. Crowley transforms the ritual from its Golden Dawn
roots into something distinctly Crowleyan. The Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram is very much
grounded in the Judeo-Christian systems as is evidenced by the use of the names of the God.
Similarly, where The Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram has Raphael, Gabriel, Michael, and
Auriel, The Star Ruby posits Iynges, Teletarch, Synochs, and dæmons. Crowley’s Thelemic
rewriting of it ultimately serves the same banishing function but, as DuQuette has claimed, it
is shaped to fit the new formulae entailed in the Æon of Horus.35
Crowley is clearly
appropriating it, ‘updating it’ to fit the new era of human history, in order to serve a function
in the context of Thelema.
Crowley omitted a crucial aspect of the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram which gives
insight to the discipline and knowledge he expected of the practitioner. He removed the
process of physically tracing the pentagrams in the air. He may have deemed it no longer
necessary or it could have been a simple oversight. His omission, either way, is important in
the ritual as it is believed that the direction in which the pentagram is drawn determines
whether the respective element is invoked or banished.36
For example, The Greater Ritual of
the Pentagram includes side-by-side examples of the invoking and banishing pentagrams; the
Invoking Pentagram of Fire traces the first line from the top-most point down to the lower
right point. The Banishing Pentagram of Fire traces this line in the opposite direction, from
35
DuQuette, The Magick of Aleister Crowley, 53.
36
Ibid., 54.

47
the bottom right point up to the top.37
Crowley may have implicitly incorporated this into the
imagining of the pentagrams which are then cast forth. DuQuette expresses this view, stating
that the ritual assumed the proficiency of the magician in conjuring the correct pentagrams to
such an extent that it came naturally in this stage.38
Therefore, even as a simple daily ritual,
Crowley assumed a degree of knowledge and skill to be held by the magician in order to
guarantee the efficacy of the ritual. Crowley seems to have seen it as possible to internalise
the ritual in a way, in that the outward action was able to be replaced by the mere thought. He
instead emphasised the importance of the mental condition of the magician as it is necessary
for him to be able to perform the action in his mind before ‘casting it.’
Crowley’s prescription of this banishing ritual demanded the purification of the ritual
space so that the individual could carry out further Magickal actions effectively. Crowley
stated of banishing rituals that ‘cleanliness is next to Godliness, and had better come first.’39
He compared the necessity of having a pure ritual space to that of building a ship, in that an
impure space is comparable to leaving a hole in which water can enter and destroy it. He
stated explicitly that ‘the first task of the Magician in every ceremony is therefore to render
his Circle absolutely impregnable.’40
Crowley drew direct comparison with the ritual
practices of magicians throughout history who would meticulously avoid ‘pollution’ in the
time leading up to a ritual for fear that it may inhibit their success. He highlighted the
‘superior’ understanding of contemporary magicians entailing that this process can be largely
done away with because rituals such as The Star Ruby are capable of internal purification
which renders other forms redundant.41
Crowley was clear in presenting the importance of
purity for the individual, offering the most efficient way by which this could be achieved in
37
Crowley, Magick: Book Four, fig. 35b.
38
DuQuette, The Magick of Aleister Crowley, 55.
39
40
Ibid.
41
Ibid., 212.

48
order to serve the Magickal working. His extensive push for this reflected the power he saw
in ritual workings, as well as how central they were in the pursuit of Will. He clearly believed
that it was necessary for the magician to protect themselves against outside intrusions, as well
as making sure that they had full control over their own ritual working.
Crowley instructed practitioners of ritual magic to cultivate and control their mental
states in order to aid their success in the ritual. He did not merely view it as a product of
physical actions which achieve results, but the ability of the magician to focus his attention
and cultivate his mental powers in order to bring about change. Crowley saw this to be of
such importance that it is even deemed necessary to record their practitioner’s mental states
in the reports of ritual workings in order to determine their efficacy.42
He prescribed a
number of ways by which this might be achieved, but one is worth touching on in particular
here. He discussed pratyahara, or withdrawal, as a dimension of Patanjali Yoga. He insisted
on using this technique so that one could relinquish the suffering of an overactive mind,
restraining it in order to then contemplate uninterrupted on a single idea.43
He offered a
method of achieving this in Liber III vel Jugorum. He prescribed this ritual as a method by
which one comes to rule their speech, action, and thought. Thought being the focus here, his
method for controlling this will therefore be investigated.
Crowley’s Jugorum offers a method for controlling ones’ own thoughts so that he
may then move towards meditations on specific subjects with the goal of achieving self-
cultivation and discipline. He began by stating that one ought to abstain from thinking about a
specific subject which commonly arises naturally or in conversation. He also stated that the
individual must create ‘two personalities’ which can be swapped between by a simple
42
Ibid., 604.
43
Ibid. 24-26

49
physical cue, and that these personalities must run contrary to one another. He gave the
following example:
let A be a man of strong passions, skilled in the Holy Qabalah, a vegetarian, and a
keen “reactionary” politician; let B be a bloodless and ascetic thinker, occupied with
business and family cares, an eater of meat, and a keen progressive politician.44
He continued to state that if the thoughts appropriate to A arise while acting as B, one should
inflict some punishment, such as running a razor across an arm, in order to both record
missteps and remind oneself of the purpose of the endeavour.45
He demonstrated the
importance of the individual to have complete self-control, providing Jugorum as one method
by which this could be achieved. His system of Magick as applied in Thelemic rituals thus
offers a clear insight into the extent to which he saw religious practice as a matter purely of
the individual. He placed all religious responsibility in the individual participant, as it is their
religious life that is the sole target of these ritual practices. He did not offer rituals as
reverential actions towards a higher being, instead providing them as ways by which the
religious participant becomes the higher being.
Conclusion
Crowley structured ritual, and ritual space, as a deeply personal affair. The centrality
of the ‘Great Work,’ the following of True Will, demonstrates the cosmological importance
of every aspect of the ritual sphere. Crowley described Magick as occupying all actions in
one’s life, but it is through the rituals that the relationship between the individual, their Will,
and the Universe is exposed. He saw the interacting and interconnected symbols as
44
Ibid., 659.
45
Ibid., 660.

50
extensions of the magician through which they are able to manipulate the forces in the
Universe. For example, the ritual Reguli is an invocation used to cultivate the Energies of the
Æon of Horus by means of invoking the four elements and the Beast.46
He saw this to be
achieved through the physical tracing of pentagrams of a particular orientation and in a very
specific direction. He made it clear the level of knowledge and discipline that is expected,
while still keeping ritual as a fundamentally individualistic practice in terms of both the ritual
environment and the goals of it.
Crowley advocated a highly individualised approach to ritual workings. He stated that
one should be able to identify not only their True Will, but their capabilities and position in
life. He asserted that ‘True Will has no goal; its nature being To Go.’47
He therefore
presented it as a continuous process or path in life which one follows. He compared it to
being at the top of a cliff and contemplating how to reach the bottom of it; the most direct
route which expends the least energy would be to jump, however this would destroy the
individual. He believed that the same is true in Magick, in that one must make gradual their
steps.48
Because of this, Crowley’s rituals are provided in order to aid the magician in their
pursuit of their Will, designed in such a way as to allow the magician to configure them in a
way deemed appropriate to their own individual Will.
46
Ibid., 573-576.
47
Ibid., 581.
48
Ibid.

51
Conclusion: Reconsidering Crowley
Aleister Crowley’s religion of Thelema incorporates a number of core principles and
actions that define it as an individualistic religion. He did this as a method of departure from
Christianity, among other major religious traditions, in order to benefit the individual. He
appears to have rejected models of ritual and religion that place community at the centre, as
the defining feature. By looking at Crowley, one gains certain insights into how ‘occult’
religions might be thought to contravene in academic assumptions about religion. Crowley
relocated the focal point of religious life to the individual, making self-cultivation and self-
empowerment the priorities.
Crowley’s championing of individualism had the side effect that he was no longer
able to claim authority on religious matters, even as the founder, or ‘receiver’ of the religion
and religious text. He initially attempted to work around this by asserting his connection with
Aiwass as a legitimiser of his authority, although later relinquishing this in favour of allowing
a more universalised approach in which individuals took control of their own religious life.
He remained, to an extent, an authority on rituals, but always in such a way that they
remained fundamentally individualistic matters. His role as authority on matters of religious
practice in no way took away from Thelema as practically individualistic because the rituals
merely provided an outline which could be coloured to suit the individual Thelemite. His
rituals remained fundamentally self-serving methods of pursuing religious goals.
Crowley attempted to restrain the flourishing individualism in textual interpretation
because it took away his own control over it, leaving interpretations to infinitely cascade out
of coherence. He did by means of the Hermetic Qabalah, a classificatory scheme that he
prescribed as a hermeneutical tool. He tried to alienate his authority to this scheme, claiming
that Aiwass laced the text with Qabalistic puzzles. Crowley asserted that it was through his

52
own works on Qabalistic correspondences that the true underlying meanings ought to be
drawn out. Crowley’s relinquishing of authority to the greatest extent that he could shows the
way by which he wished to ‘free’ the individual from mainstream religious commitments and
relocate religion and religious responsibility in the individual practitioner. However, he
remained aware that completely surrendering The Book of the Law to infinite individualistic
interpretations would ultimately render the text meaningless because any person could
interpret it in any way that he or she saw fit. Crowley therefore appears to have
contextualised it within Thelema, and filtered interpretation through the syncretic system of
the Hermetic Qabalah. This meant that Crowley proved unable to fully break the distinction
between teacher and student, or institution and individual. Despite his sporadic burst of
modesty in claiming to also be a student alongside others, he seems bound to a structure in
which he ultimately claimed authority over individual adherents.
Read through a hermeneutics of faith, Crowley’s rituals appear to establish Thelema
as an individualistic religion. Crowley used these rites as a method by which Thelemites are
able to take hold of their own religious activity according to their own personal
characteristics. His banishing ritual, The Star Ruby, is an archetypical ritual which
exemplifies the structure and nature of individual religious practice. He prescribed actions
only as a framework for the individual to fill in themselves. Crowley’s emphasis on the
dimensions of the altar and ritual space are one such example of this, as it sets a guideline
which the practitioner then customises according to their own means. He thus established a
staunchly individualistic religion which is almost entirely centred on the individual and his or
her religious experience.
Crowley is commonly dismissed and overlooked because he is viewed as insane or
misinterpreted as a Satanist. However, interpreting his works in a new spirit of generosity
allows one to see his religion as a reaction to his cultural environment, particularly his

The Perfection of the Individual: Analysing Crowley's Individualistic Religion

The Perfection of the Individual: Analysing Crowley's Individualistic Religion

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